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Grace and peace to you from him who is, and who was, and who is to come, and from the seven spirits before his throne,5 and from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth.

To him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood,6 and has made us to be a kingdom and priests to serve his God and Father—to him be glory and power for ever and ever! Amen.

7 "Look, he is coming with the clouds,"and "every eye will see him,even those who pierced him";and all peoples on earth "will mourn because of him."So shall it be! Amen.

8 "I am the Alpha and the Omega," says the Lord God, "who is, and who was, and who is to come, the Almighty."

(Revelation 1:4-8New International Version.)

Come, let us sing for joy to the Lord;let us shout aloud to the Rock of our salvation.

I'm not uncomfortable with the command to put on the other virtues such as love, or the call to walk in peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self control. But the command to joy makes me comprehensively faint.

I know how difficult these other virtues are and how far I've got to go in becoming Christlike in these areas too.

But all most other aspects of the Spirit seem familiar to me in some measure, except joy.

Joy is the one quality of the Spirit that I feel estranged from and completely lacking. It is the one area of my faith (and maybe that of our Christian subculture) that I've made very little progress in - maybe none at all; maybe negative progress?

And so the command to "rejoice always" is troubling to me, to say the least. The Apostle Paul in fact, in his letter to the Philippians, goes as far as stating that "it is right for me to feel this [joy]..." So by inference it is wrong of me to not rejoice or have joy in Christ for my salvation.

So when I look at Psalm 95:1 and verses like it running throughout the entire Bible, I realize that my current and our modern Christian spirituality is not well. I and probably a whole heap of us are missing a key ingredient of the mature (not normal) Christian life, which to a significant extent means we carry a kind-of spiritual sickness. Our faith is lacking, and weak. We look like malnourished baby Christians.

And this is not an amazing discovery. The New Testament regularly points to people and churches who lack one or even many marks of a complete or mature faith; lovelessness, pride, foolishness and lack of self-control are chief among them.

But what is amazing is that our joylessness is so normal; it is so widespread in our western reformed evangelical subcultures.

Now I don't think that Paul would have believed in completely joyless Christians, and I'm not suggesting for a moment that I or any of my sincere Christian brothers and sisters around me have no joy whatsoever in Christ; we are not devoid of joy, it is just not nearly big enough - it should be a strong and growing and evident mark of the Spirit in our behaviour and lifestyle.

And so there are a two things that Psalm 95:1 remind me of, rebuke me for and correct in me:

1. Joy is a command, just like love and peace and patience and all the other virtues. It is not first a feeling. It is firstly an obedient response of faith; the feeling of joy is subservient to the primary act of faith. It is right to be joyful or rejoice because wholehearted faith in Christ is right, and joy comes from faith in Christ.

And that leads to the second thing that Psalm 95:1 reminds me of:

2. Joy is a response to Christ himself; for who he is (our Rock) and for what he has done for us, me and you (our Salvation). It is when I displace my reliance on him as my Rock by throwing the weight of my trust behind any other (false and counterfeit) confidence or hope or love that I lose joy. It is when I start looking to myself or my things or abilities or achievements or others (or whatever) to justify my existence or prove my worth that I lose joy.

This is why the Psalmist can call on his congregation to "Come, let us sing for joy to the Lord; let us shout aloud to the Rock of our salvation." Because he knows that the remedy of his and every heart is to repent in faith by re-putting our hope in Christ alone; all other ground is sinking sand.

I went ten pin bowling for the first time in 20 years with our family a few weeks back. It reminded me of how hard it is to fix your eyes on the target; nine times out of ten my eyes would wander and fix on my feet or the track itself. Needless to say I didn't score well - but for brief bursts when I could control my focus it was quite thrilling to watch the result!

Gosh I need to learn this lesson, in general! This is exactly what I do in life. I'm always looking everywhere except at what I'm actually (meant to be) aiming for: Christ himself.

Psalm 25:15 (NIV)

My eyes are ever on the Lord,for only he will release my feet from the snare.

My eyes are ever on myself! Or my to-do list, or that nebulous cloud of problems to solve and worries to resolve.

Everyday, every morning and evening and mindful moment, I need to tell the eyes of my heart to look to the only one who can save my feet from their perils.

Christ is the only one who can keep my feet from falling; he's the only one who can release them from the life traps that ensnare them - the "worries and troubles of life, the deceitfulness of wealth and the desire for other things" that come in and choke the seed of God's Word in my heart, keeping me from fruitfulness; keeping me from the results of the Spirit.

Joe, control those wayward eyes! Keep them on Jesus! If you look at anything else, you'll suffer for it.

'My eyes are ever on Christ, for only he will release my feet from the sin that so easily entangles.'

I find I often live as if the Lord were far off, but think as though he is always near, to everyone.

As a Christian I believe Christ is not only omnipresent but unconditionally with me "always, to the very End".

We know that not only did Christ promise his active ruling (reign) from the throne of our hearts, but that according to the Apostle Paul, even for those who refuse to believe "he is not far from anyone of us".

And here is the danger: I fall into the trap of assuming his presence and then getting on with forgetting all about him.

But then I see in the Scripture a constant reminder to hold this truth in tension with another:

He is near to those who draw near to him.

Psalm 145:18-19(NIV)

The Lord is near to all who call on him,to all who call on him in truth.He fulfills the desires of those who fear him;he hears their cry and saves them.

Elsewhere we in fact see that he withdraws his presence to test us (e.g Hezekiah) and rewards those who seek him by drawing near to them (Hebrews 11:1-3)

In the Gospel of John Jesus says that he will come and make his home with those who love and obey him - and we think this just applies to non Christians.

But then in Revelation he says to the churches "here I am, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone opens the door I will come in and eat [fellowship] with him".

I guess this is why Paul constantly prayed for *Christians* that we would have power so that Christ would dwell [set up his home and throne] in our hearts through faith.

The shock to the way I live and think is that actually the Lord is near especially to some - and that will only be me if I respond to him with the step of faith that he calls on me to make!

He is near to those who call on him!

And that's me if and when I call out in hope, when I cry out in faith, when I pour out to him in love.

That's where I want to be; or rather, that's where I want him to be - near to me!

Joe Towns, 19 October 2016 on "Ways to
increase financial capacityfor
church planting":

Church Planting involves
money. It involves money before hand, during, and for some time after. This
elective explores how we can get the church finances geared up for church
planting.

From planning years in
advance, saving up cash reserves, to being prepared and able to support the new
church plant for X number of years after the church plant takes place, even
though the mother church has lost 40% of its congregation to the church plant;

There are some obvious
well known avenues to explore here, but there are also less known avenues to
explore.

Just as we want to be visionaries when it comes to
church planting, we also need to be visionaries in how we treat our finances.

I’ve headed up a
successful business for over 5 years and gained experience in managing
money/planning ahead/developing projects.

This is a businessman's
perspective to the topic of how to grow our financial capacity for Church
Planting.

I’m told that we are
often doing lowest-common-denominator / small association type bookkeeping in
our churches. There are things that might be possible if we were a bit more
proactive with our finances that we never get to, because we are just staying
afloat.

My goal is to push you
to consider things that may be beyond your current field of view.

And a quick disclaimer:

When preparing for this
elective the organisers suggested that my pre-existing knowledge and insights
will be ok to draw on.

So this is not a highly
researched elective that considers broader perspectives comprehensively…

Rather my goal is simply
to sow a few ideas and take questions to allow discussion.

Firstly a few personal convictions
and values about risks in this area:

God’s Word consistently
warns us about money and possessions from beginning to end. Because of sin the
dangers are immense, including being ruled by it, trusting in it, and loving
and serving it.

·We
need to treat our finances – and teach our churches to treat their money and
possessions - like a powerful source of radiation; urgently understanding it
and particularly how to handle it sufficiently cautiously; only then can its
immense power be used for good.

·Prosperity
gospel proponents are examples of being too positive and not cautious enough
and tainting evangelicalism – but we must not overreact (and I think we often
do).

·We
can also fall into Finney's false revivalism – Finney believed that by the
right use of “means” we can cause revival; but no effort can create the results
of the Spirit.

·As
churches become more ‘business like’ we also need to heed John Piper’s warning:
“Brothers, we are not professionals!” - The best run church materially,
commercially, with KPI results, without out the true goods of the gospel and
godliness, is a con. The name we give a successful business or church that
doesn’t deliver its promised service or product is a “scam”.

·Boards
of Management exist in part to manage the conflict of interest and risk to elderships
around finances; it must be seen as ministry and valued by elders and leaders. It
is a ‘loving’ act to manage church finances diligently and do administration
well. It is actually the Bible’s command to love our people, our church, the
gospel and the glory of God that we must manage quality and compliance
exceptionally well.

But the Bible stresses
the positive as well as the negative aspects of money. Money can be a snare
depending on our motives, but it can and should be used as a blessing and can
fuel the gospel.

We need to build a positive
and constructive culture based upon right theology; money matters and profit itself
is not evil.

Money and ‘business’ all
comes from God and can be a sign of his blessing and provision; in the gospel, money
can and should be used to advance his kingdom.

·We
need to be preaching regularly on this topic to re-calibrate our Christian
mindset which is strongly influenced by the prevailing culture of
individualism, consumerism, and greed.

·God
entrusts some believers with wealth in order to provide enormous opportunity
for doing good in this world and for the gospel.

·We
can dramatically increase our financial capacity for church planting as God’s
word increasingly revolutionises how we treat our personal finances as
Christians; acknowledging that it all actually belongs to God and is only
loaned to us for serving one another and doing good; thanking him for it; devoting
it to his service; supporting gospel work with it; giving to the poor; remaining
humble; not trusting it and valuing heavenly riches more than money and
possessions.

·We
need to regularly preach and teach on the value of ordinary work, for the sake
of the gospel; we need to esteem the gospel perspective on paid commercial
work; work is actually a moral duty - The bible criticises those who don’t work
by choice – work has been ordained by God as a means of fulfilment and service
(balanced by rest) that brings honour to God as we become self-supporting, find
self-fulfilment and serve others; any legitimate work can be seen as God’s
calling and a stewardship from God himself.

·And
so we need regular teaching, encouragement and modelling of righteous
stewardship as the handling of money is a crucial test of our godliness; in the
Bible, believers must use money in a God honouring way; for the support of the
family, for benefiting the poor, especially God’s people, and for the work of
God’s kingdom; believers are to be wise stewards of all of their God-given
gifts, including the wise use of their material possessions, including using it
to benefit others; developing or growing it responsibly and sharing their money
and possessions, especially amongst Christians. Christians are actually
commanded to give of their money and material possessions willingly,
cheerfully, spontaneously, regularly, and generously – in obedience, gratitude to
God and in love for others. And God actually rewards the giver appropriately;
encouraging them to be enterprising in giving, sometimes overwhelming the
giver.

·The
gospel work of calling on faith and repentance is not a separate work to
calling on people (Christians and non-Christians) to give to the work of the
gospel; in Luke’s gospel giving is seen as a crucial way to express faith and
repentance, and we need to call on all people, including non-Christians to give
away their worldly treasures in order to come to Christ.

·Since
God is the Lord of all the earth he has often used the ‘wealth of the
unbeliever’ or their possessions to further the gospel so we should be bold in
telling them "the Lord needs it" (Triumphal Entry; Matthew 21)

·Our
financial capacity to plant churches is directly proportional to our capacity
to sell the gospel and our vision for reaching the world and doing good in this
world to people – because it is the gospel itself that is for sale; people need
to buy it (Jesus says "come buy food without cost...") – but the “price”
is your whole life and everything in it (which we count as worth nothing…rubbish
compared to the exchange rate, the profit we gain (!); and for the Christian godliness
continues to be the same trade and exchange (Jesus says "I counsel you to
buy from me gold refined in the fire.").

·As
in the early church in the book of Acts (remember they stopped regarding
anything they owned as their own; selling their possessions and pooling their
funds), if we are selling to people the immeasurable features and benefits of
Christ, then (with the Spirit’s enabling) money for church planting is not
going to be an issue; it will just flow.

So those are my personal
convictions and values on finances and the church that become the paradigm
within which someone CAN be proactive, hard-headed and 'entrepreneurial' in
church finance planning.

For more there is an
APPENDIX: Summary of the Bible Theme of Finances.

Being more diligent with the details

I’m now going to give a
few relatively basic things that churches might be missing. Bread and butter
financial stuff that churches might be failing in, doing badly in or have not
have considered…

Valuing work and workers

·We
need to work hard at building a culture that attracts 'all' the gifts that we need
for healthy churches (1 Corinthians 12) – and that means diversity, including a
healthy population of workers and those with gifts of giving. We need to be
actively supporting workers to be diligent at work, to persevere, endure
hardship and keep thanking God for the ability to produce wealth, and to be
using it to build our churches, through financial self-sacrifice. The book of
Proverbs in trying to save us from foolishness says, “Get your fields in order,
and then build your house.” That applies to building churches too, doesn’t it?

Valuing
finances

·We
need to really value every little dollar; not only for the reasons mentioned
but also because if you count your cents, the dollars will take care of
themselves. We need to carefully count, watch, protect and steward every little
dollar because of the sweat and tears it has taken to arrive at that money
after it has been given to us; it had to be worked for and earned, and then
some of it went to compulsory superannuation and entitlements, and a massive
proportion went on tax, and then a massive proportion of it went to sustain the
worker with food and living expenses, and then only after all that it was given
to the church by faith. And so for every $1 dollar that we are given, an
employer needed to earn something like $99 and then pay the worker something
like $60... So don't waste it.

Valuing
saving

·Wastage
is a massive problem in our world, and particularly in our culture and society.
If we want to increase our capacity financially we need to remove wastage. We
need to adopt what has been coined “lean” models and systems of working. If
you’re interested visit www.lean.org.au. There was something very good and
right and productive about a culture of being thrifty, industrious, and dare I
say it frugality. But our generation today has lost a lot of that. This isn’t
about cutting corners so much as trimming fat. If you understand this, then you
will change the way you work, plan and spend money: Saving $25,000 is exactly
equivalent to receiving $25,000.

Valuing
governance and management

·You
need to learn how to read, use, manage, and oversee a Budget, Profit & Loss
Statement, a Balance Sheet, Cash Flow, and a Treasurer. We need regular training
for our whole board and elders, and treasurers, in financial management. I’ve
prepared an APPENDIX: 101 of Financial Management if this is a particular need
for you, your board members and/or your elders. I recommend that boards adopt a
set of ‘standards’ for your church (and I would recommend CMA’s Essential
Standards; if you’re interested visit www.cma.net.au). It is partly because we leave the
thinking about the money to our treasurers that we have less financial capacity
than we could have; because financial management is not only about careful book
keeping, it is also about leadership and decision-making, such as your
philosophy of finances, investment decisions regarding accounts and interest,
term deposits, purchases and other expenses. As a leader of a church or church
plant, how can you grow your financial capacity if you’re not leading your
board of management with well advised and informed and strategic decision
making? We also need to ask, seek and knock for accountants, financial and
business people who will strengthen our boards and leadership in this area.

Valuing
planning

·We
need to get better at planning, valuing planning and focusing on it as a core
activity of the leadership and the board of management. A budget is a plan. If
all you do is put this year’s expenses into next year’s budget and show the
church that it all balances, then your plan is no change, no growth. That is a
hopeless plan. What are your goals? 1 year, 3 year, 5 year and 10 year goals.
What strategies will you use to achieve them? How can you realistically
estimate the costs and therefore saving that will be needed to be able to plan
to implement those strategies? You need to get your strategic plan done and
then you need to gear up your budget to incorporate your strategic plans, and
demonstrate how in stages based on realistically achievable assumptions, you
will be able to change and grow. That will invariably mean you will need to
spend more on those strategic measures. And for that you’re going to need to
receive more funds and/or save more funds and/or reduce other expenses.

·Jesus says in Luke 14:28, “Suppose one of you
wants to build a tower. Will he not first sit down and estimate the cost to see
if he has enough money to complete it?” Pretty good advice for church
planting too! We refer to this teaching as being about the cost of becoming a
disciple, but couldn’t it also be about the cost of building the church – the
cost of completing what the apostles and disciples are called to do?

So now I’m going to give
some bigger picture things; proactive things and some more ‘outside the box'
things to help you think big and gear up for the scale of what could be possible
in church planting.

Growing yourself

·Some
guru somewhere says the top 3 things that attract finances are vision,
leadership and networking. And the relationship between the three is crucial to
understand: (Vision + Leadership) multiplied by Networking = Financial Capacity.
So work on these top three (3) things – particularly networking, as it is the multiplier.

oSo
firstly, you need to be able to give your givers something to invest in; it
needs to be compelling enough to ‘earn’ their ‘buy-in’ to it, literally; so you
need to get the vision right. Vision
fuels finances. People give to vision, not to need. If you cast a compelling
vision that captures the hearts of people, you will have an army of people that
will want to follow you and throw their lives as well as their money into it.

oDevelop
your leadership abilities.
Leadership accelerates finances.
Financial supporters have to “buy you” before they fund you. Most
supporters invest in the planter over the plan. So don’t think it is all about
your polished strategic plan and budget; it is actually all about you (as
‘wrong’ as that sounds) (your vision, your leadership, and then lastly, your
networking)…

oNetworking exponentially increases your funding
capacity. It’s not what you know, and
it’s not who you know; but it’s who knows
you – what counts is that people hear your vision and trust your
leadership, and lots and lots of them.

So it is the
combination of the strength of your vision plus leadership ability that is
together multiplied by your
networking that will determine your financial capacity for church planting.

·To
grow yourself it is also key (as I’ve already suggested) to get serious about
becoming ‘money’ and ‘business’ wise; get a book on ‘financial management for
dummies. Befriend accountants and auditors and financial planners (if you meet
one – jump on them): take them to lunch and ask them for advice; ask them to
run a session for you and your leadership or for your workers and business
owners. You need to do the same with befriending business owners; sign up to non-for-profit
community and financial fundraising newsletters and read them (if you’re interested,
visit www.ourcommunity.com.au and other resources listed below under “Resources”).

·There
is also a place for contextualisation: if you want to find not only the lost
but also financial supporters then being ‘all things to all men’ can include
learning to ‘use’ professionalism and a culture of excellence in order to
attract the business minded Christian community. So, you need to learn about
marketing and advertising, events management, human resource management, and
all things corporate and business development. Planting a church is many
things, but it includes running an organisation in the 21st Century
– so learn how our culture runs organisations successfully.

Now other than growing
yourself, there are two main ways to increase your financial capacity:

1. Reduce your expenses
- without losing any income; and (or)

2. Increase your income
- without increasing your expenses!

It’s not rocket science.
So let’s look at each one in turn:

Reducing your expenses

Alternatives
to spending

·The
first thing to realise with expenses is that you don’t need to have money to
have assets, currency or capacity. If you need a car, or if you need printing
then that is what you need; not necessarily the money to buy it. Donations,
contra sponsorship and shared services are all important to promote and
facilitate. Jesus taught that we should be asking for local sponsorship of evangelism
(i.e. Jesus said, ‘take nothing for the journey; whenever you enter a town or
house and are welcomed, stay there and eat whatever is offered you…’ Mark 6 /
Luke 10).

·There
is an enormous amount of reinventing the wheel that can and could be avoided
through more partnership and collaboration between churches and individuals,
other organisations and other churches. Examples of this being done in small
measure currently include Vision 100 IT; Care Consultancy’s at-cost printing
for non-for-profit organisations (for more information visit www.careconsultancy.com.au). We should also be sharing services
for areas such as legal advice, financial planning and investment and
accounting; we should be getting along side and getting on-side well-resourced
individuals and local businesses of both non-Christian and Christian owners and
creating local strategic alliances that enable opportunities for contra
sponsorship, co-location, and at-cost purchasing or shared services; a company
may not be able to gift you money but you can leverage their buying power or
other resources.

Selective
spending

·Spending
selectively is an important way to reduce your expenses and avoid wastage. Strategic spending is crucial, but why spend
money if it is avoidable? If you want to increase your financial capacity you
can make sure that all of your money is spent on achieving your mission if you
have a policy of eliminating all avoidable spending. For example, new chairs
that look more professional – careful consideration needs to be given for
alternative funding such as crowdsourcing before you would sacrifice your
future goals for the sake of an up-to-date look and feel in your furniture. But
spending money on a CRM database may be the opposite – the technology may
enable you to effectively network, follow up, communicate and build your
stakeholder commitment. Another example includes getting into a 5 year contract
with a digital printing company where 95% of your money goes on the lease and
only 5% on printing – we need to be very careful and savvy to ensure that we’re
selecting value for money purchases that will actually make a difference to our
mission.

Reducing
your biggest expense

·The
biggest difference is always made by focusing a spot light on your biggest
expenses – which for churches is the salary cost of staffing. This means that
even a small improvement in this area can radically increase your financial
capacity just by doing anything that eases this burden; the most obvious
example is supplementing your income with some self-funding – i.e. tent
ministry of which the Apostle Paul is the example. The fact is; no one is only
a church planter. Everyone has other skills. Do some relief teaching. Build
websites. Raise some money with your other skills. The pattern of Jesus and
Paul is that evangelism and church planting should not depend on funding –
therefore ‘tent ministry’ always needs to be considered and is always an option.
Ed Stetzer agrees with Paul when he says you can plant a church without any money
through self-funded evangelists or off the back of so called ‘lay’ ministry.
Now if that is the case, why shouldn’t we think about at least supplementing
full-time paid Christian work with some self-funding? Paul said that he avoiding
dependency by working and paying his way was a model to follow of self-sufficiency
and self-support! (2 Thessalonians 3).

·By
the way this also means that we need to be very, very careful not to ‘burn’ any
ground we make in our church financial capacity by smaller, ad hoc and less
strategic employment decisions of assistant or evangelistic support staff.
There are no rules around this of course, but it needs to be said that all the
good work of years of building financial capacity for church planting could be
undone by one simple employment decision. We need to be very deliberate and
cautious about employing church staff off the back of savings because this is our biggest expense. One wrong move
in this department is more damaging than hundreds of little areas of wastage.

Now as well as reducing
your expenses - without losing any income… the other way to increase your
financial capacity is: Increase your income - without increasing your expenses!

And ideally you do them
both!

Raising more funds

Increasing
regular giving / Raising up regular givers

·Deliberately
raise-up givers and build the gift of giving onto your list of key identified
needs areas that we target and recruit for – like you would any gift! Why would
we be head hunting only the word gifts and hospitality and musicians, for
example: We need to build around the church planter a team of “gospel patrons”
- the name given to people whose
profound generosity has enabled the great movements and revivals down through
history (for more visit www.gospelpatrons.org). These people need close partnership
and relationship because their commitment to giving is directly tied to their
belief in you, your vision and your progress. If you have needs, they want to
know about it and expect an honest and frank phone call or catch up about it –
they want to be there for you to enable you to do the work.

·Build
your plan and core team on the mall concept. Malls secure their anchor stores
before they begin construction, and then fill in with smaller stores. Work diligently to secure the right ‘anchor partners’
for your new church. Partners bring prospective partners. Potential financial
partners want to know who else is committed to this plant financially.

·Elevate
giving as a whole church to the vital role it really has, a key part of our
worship and love and faith response, like singing or the Lord’s Supper. One way
to do this is set targets as a whole church and share progress regularly – such
as a pie chart with the proportion of the churches giving and where it goes,
and how much we are aiming for as a church to be giving to third parties. It
will grow our financial capacity if we learn to give as a holistic community,
rather than individualistically – and the way to do that is enabling people to
give to a third party via the church and tag their offering with that donation;
then the whole church can benefit from seeing the whole picture of where the
congregation’s money is going (how much we are achieving together!). If we want
to be able to plant a church, then we need to grow the percentage of the churches
offering that gets on-directed to other church plants!

Attracting
more or bigger donations

·Ed
Stetzer on Rethinking Church Plant
Funding gives a heap of good advice, including: you need to understand the
two levels of financial support: individual and organisations, including
denominations. There are also two types of giving: regular giving by members
and one off donations by individuals (e.g. visitors) or organisations (e.g.
denominations or local businesses). Individuals will give because they love
you; churches, denominations and larger organizations will give because they
trust your leadership and plan. Focus the majority of your fundraising time on
organisations over individuals. Individuals tend to give dollars while
organizations give thousands of dollars.

·Work
on attracting donations / get better
(or start!) fundraising for donations from those who are not members of your
church (why do only parachurches do this?): Church leaders need to see
themselves as fundraisers. Learn about marketing and advertising; networking; the
power of the proposal, the letter etc; hone your communication skills in order
to express the opportunities and your needs to the people God brings your way, selling
techniques etc. Why shouldn’t a church planter put direct targeted proposals to
organisations? (Some give a percentage of their profits or income prior to taking
a dividend).

·Learn
to broaden the net of fundraising. After every appointment, ask the question,
“Do you know anyone else who may be interested in this church plant or has a
heart for this work?” You need to see every person as a door to a whole group
of other potential partners in your work.

·All
of the money you need is sitting in the bank accounts of people; and that’s a
good thing! Therefore Christians saving money is to be encouraged. Saving money
is an antidote to spending money in a culture of extremely high waste. You can
only give what you have and you will only have if you have saved. Paul
encouraged Christians to save in order to give (2 Corinthians), "saving it
up so that when I come..." The way you save is spend less than you earn –
and in a consumer culture this needs to be encouraged. As Christians build
their wealth within a gospel framework God will use them to provide for your
church plant and its gospel work.

·We
need to be bolder, in asking for and calling on people to ‘invest in the
gospel’; boldly and regularly – why don’t we ask for more?! (“Ask and it will
be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and it will be opened to you.
For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the
door will be opened” (Matthew 7:7-8)). We
should be making more of the offering talk (not just tacking it onto the end of
a sermon) (the worker is worth his wages).We should be asking visitors to give and contribute –
e.g. credit card slips for visitors. We should be asking non-Christians to
give. We should be asking local businesses.

·We
need to be praying for more; asking God for connections and strong
relationships with business leaders, the business community and wealthy
Christians that will provide what is needed to grow our church planting
capacity.

Increasing
(or starting!) other standard fund raising activities

·Lastly,
you need to start and create a culture of fundraising within your church; like
any club, school, community organisation or political party – we as a community
could be doing so many standard activities that regularly and effectively build
a reliable and sustainable supplementary income stream into the budget (why is
it that only ‘parachurch’ groups actually do conventional fundraising?) What
school or community group doesn’t do regular barbeques? (We should be the first
and best at this, not the last and worst!) (I remember when I was growing up,
our church, which had bought its own building off the back of fundraising
efforts – every year went through a series of fun and community engaging
fundraising activities – such as the annual ‘slave’ auction). Megachurches
have learned how to do this well (maybe that is why they get so big?). They
will give out copies of the sermon but always ask for a gold coin donation;
they will produce their training material in booklet form and always sell
copies for $5 or $10 or $20 a copy – you have gone to all that effort; so let’s
not waste the opportunity. There are many, many more common fund raising ideas
online if you’re interested. You could even consider “seed funding” an
initiative - using money to create money, which is often needed anyway to get
set up for effective fundraising efforts. And remember, every one of these
activities can be furthering your work in more ways than just fueling the
finances – they engage your community, further your name and are a perfect
way to promote your meetings.

·And
finally, identify, be aware and take advantage of opportunities that arise to
seek bigger funding opportunities from organisations specifically in that
business; e.g. The Tasmanian Community Fund grant submission rounds (for more
visit www.tascomfund.org) ; the
Genesis Charitable Foundation (visit www.genesisfoundation.org.au) ;
known Christian business owners or investors who are always open to a letter or
a proposal. This is where you need to learn how to write a letter and learn the
power of the letter or the written proposal. It comes down to the clarity and
compulsion of your vision, strategy and implementation plan, including your own
leadership. But you need to get that all together anyway for your church plant
to succeed. So if you’ve got it, sell it. There is nothing to stop you writing,
calling, meeting with and sitting down to convince the largest sponsors and
business owners in this country of your church plant plan, why the world needs
it and will benefit from it and why it will succeed. It all comes down to your
(vision + leadership) x networking.

·But
from the beginning money is a good gift from God; It is sin itself that
corrupts the use of money,

·Believers
understand the true nature of riches; in the gospel money can be used to
advance the kingdom.

·All
riches belong to God the creator

·God
is the giver of all wealth

·God
is the giver of the ability to produce wealth

·Riches
may be a sign of God’s blessing; believers may be blessed with riches – God
entrusts some of his people with material wealth.

·Riches
provide a great opportunity for doing good

·The
godly attitude towards and use of wealth brings glory to God:

oThey
acknowledge their riches come from God and thank him for it

oThey
are generous

oThey
devote their riches to God’s service

oThey
support gospel work and workers

oThey
give to the poor

oThey
remain humble

oThey
don’t trust in their riches

oThey
don’t love or set their heart on riches

oThey
value heavenly riches more than their wealth

·Examples
of godly people who used their money well are numerous throughout scripture
(Abraham, Solomon, Hezekiah, Job, Joseph of Arimathea); those who were wealthy
but godly, and those who had little but gave much.

Stewardship

·The
righteous stewardship and handling of money is a crucial test of godliness;

·Stewardship
is the careful, responsible use, control and management of wealth and
possessions by Christians

·Jesus
used parables to emphasise accountability and each individual’s responsibility
– and the apostles continued that emphasis.

oTo
be a good steward is an honourable thing;

oMoney
must be obtained honestly; by work, trade, investment, inheritance or gift; not
by theft, fraud, usury, at the expense of justice, by extortion, by oppression,
at the expense of health, or of witness or of spiritual wellbeing.

oMoney
must be cared for diligently, including personal money and money held on trust.

oMoney
must be used in a God honouring way; for the support of the family, for
benefiting the poor, especially God’s people, and for the work of God’s
kingdom.

oBelievers
are to be wise stewards of all of their God-given gifts, including the wise use
of their material possessions, including:

§Using
it to benefit others

§Developing
or growing it responsibly

§Sharing
their money and possessions, especially amongst Christians

Work

·Work
was actually ordained by God as a means of fulfilment and service (balanced by
rest) and can bring honour to God

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Christian Reflections

The Briefing

Phillip Jensen

Pete Woodcock & Cornerstone

I’m attracted to big ideas and new thoughts. Jesus himself was considered an astounding thinker in his time. But today we tend not to realize how our hopes in development, science and reform have nothing on the promises he made. About Christianity, we think the world of the twentieth-century is a different world. But it is about Christian things and the Christian religion that we should be turning our attention. Not only has Jesus changed our world already since the first Christmas and the first Easter, but he promises to do it further, radically further. I’m talking about more than the fact that Christian beliefs have shaped modern society [the reformation for example fueled the industrial revolution]. I also recognize the perception that Christian church attendance is in decline. But Christianity itself continues to grow. That’s because the Christian way is much more than Sunday attendance. What is Christianity and what is Christian or to put it precisely, ‘Christ’-like-living? This is not a silly question; particularly because of the way that our modern secular culture of Christmas-consumerism has clouded our clarity. That is one of many reasons why this site exists. Talking Christianity talks all about Christianity and about Christian thinking because actually what we need most in the twentieth-century it is a review of the basics of a Christ-centered view of the world. And, believe it or not, that makes our subject all about church too. That’s because, what is the Church? What actually is the church of God? Church is not a building or a meeting. The church is God’s people, his community united in Christ himself. That is, the church itself is the Christian people, all united together by common faith in Jesus. In that sense, this site is all about church because it is all about the Christian people. I hope by sharing Christian views about the world to give a window into the Christian view of the world; a window that I hope actually gives a view of Jesus, a view of Christ himself. The event of Christmas and the calendar tradition of Easter have become tools for marketers to fuel our commitment as consumers. It is a strange scenario in a secular society that swears no allegiance to the Lord himself and in fact more often than not today we only hear mention of Jesus Christ when someone in our workplaces or bus malls can find no other phrase more appropriate for a curse. Who is Jesus that his name today is heard in every corner of our world, on the lips of both those who bless one another and those who curse? Of course, the Christians call Jesus Christ by that title because they also call him the son of God, a phrase that is used not only by the Christian but by the Bible too; but what does that mean? But just as important in asking who is Jesus Christ is another related question, where is Jesus? And another more basic question might be what is Jesus; a question followed closely by who was Jesus when he came. That’s why this site talks all about Jesus, and not just about him, but also how Jesus has changed the world and will in fact change the world more fundamentally still. This is the message of the Gospel, the gospel of Jesus, or the good news of Christ Jesus. One of the central questions we ask on this site is both what is gospel and what is the gospel? How is the gospel message, that is very closely associated with the four gospels found in the beginning of the second section of the Bible, the New Testament, how is this good news of any significance for us today as modern people? One big difference is that it is a free gospel, unlike all the other gospels that exist in the world. The message at the heart for the Christians is a true story of the free gift of God’s forgiveness through a man like no other, Jesus. In the Holy Bible, as we open the pages of Scripture, we discover the facts of who this man was and who he is now, today. It will take some bible study. Of course we might ask which bible? As there are many gospels there are many bibles. The word bible means book, but the Christian book that has been called The Book is the collection of 66 books from the Scriptures of Israel (the Old Testament) and the collection of writings of the first Christians, which we have in the New Testament. Put together my many authors over hundreds of years across continents and cultures, it is the bibles view of itself is that it is the word of God to us even today. Who is God? Where do we find God? We in fact need to do little more than open up a book. But where in the bible do we find God, we might ask? Actually it is the message of the book as a whole that we have been describing as the gospel. Every part of the bible reveals God, as does the whole. So what is the Bible? In the Bible and by the Bible, God speaks of himself to us. Bible scripture and every bible verse together reveals God as we listen and understand what he has done in the past and what he has said about those things. That’s why this blog talks all about Bible and gives bible verses at every point. One of the biggest questions people ask typing in their search is help me find God. To find God the Bible says is like to find gold and with it silver and all types of costly stones as well. What is God? Surprisingly, the Bible in fact says that God Is. It’s more than he ‘just is’ but that is part of it. He is the only one who always is; the only I Am. Who is God? Part of the answer the Bible gives relates to the fact that God has revealed himself as the God of. He is the God of certain people, for example Abraham, Isaac and Jacob of ancient Israel. He revealed himself as the God of Israel. More than that, we know him as the God of Jesus. How is God the one of these people of the past, and to be so now too? Where is God? Again and again people go searching for God, going to the internet search and praying Help me God with their keyboard. We search asking God where are you? God is in heaven but he reveals us to us as God the Father, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. God is good and he has shown his love to us. That’s why this site promotes the love of God as revealed already in what he has done and has been written down for us. I love God and I want the Kingdom of God to come and the will of God to be done in this world and with this world. That’s why I talk all about God, or what might be called theology, the study of God. I want to promote thinking about God, and by focusing on God I want to highlight the benefits of the Bible’s theology for our lives and future as people.